The global alcohol market to grow like never before by 2021

By 2021, the global alcohol market is forecast to grow by over 1 billion cases, bringing annual consumption to 29.3 billion cases. That’s what the IWSR Forecast 2016-2021 Global Review report states. While there remain large category and regional variances, the overall market will experience more moderate growth than seen previously, falling from a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 1% between 2010 and 2015 to 0.6% between 2015 and 2021. Premiumisation and up-trading remain the two key trends across the globe.

BY CATEGORY – Accounting for almost three-quarters of the global alcohol market, beer will unsurprisingly register the largest volume increase of all categories at almost 905 million cases. Asian markets, including China, India and Vietnam, will be responsible for the vast majority of this growth. Meanwhile, whiskey is forecast to drive the upward growth of the global spirits market as its appeal increases across both emerging and developed markets. Large declines in many traditional vodka, brandy and cane markets, however, will largely offset whiskey’s global gains and the overall spirits market is projected to grow with a CAGR of 0.3%.Wine is the only category posting a negative outlook, with volumes driven down by a contraction of the low-priced “other wines” category (mainly local rice-based wines). However, sparkling wine is forecast to be one of the most dynamic segments of the global drinks market, posting year on year growth of 2.2% to 2021. From their much smaller bases, mixed drinks and cider will grow ahead of the overall market, with respective CAGRs of 2% and 3.8% to 2021.

BY REGION – Emerging markets continue to present strong growth opportunities for the drinks industry. Consumption in Asia is forecast to grow by 558 million cases by 2021, while Africa is set to gain an additional 219 million cases. Looking exclusively at the wine and spirits categories, Asia will still lead the global market in terms of volume growth (+63m cases), but a refocus on the important North American market by many of the major multinational players, combined with growing Millennial demand and the capture of volume from beer across both categories, will see it become the second largest growth region, resulting in an increase of more than 45 million cases. Meanwhile, Europe will experience the largest declines across these two categories, recording a loss of 60 million cases by the end of the forecast period.

BY QUALITY – Up-trading and premiumisation are fundamentally changing the landscape of the global drinks market. Within the combined wine and spirits market, the low-priced segment will see its share of volumes gradually eroding from 44.5% in 2015 to 41% by 2021 as consumers across almost all regions and categories look to trade up where possible. This will result in a loss of more than 215 million cases by the end of the forecast period. At the other end of the scale, premium wines and spirits are expected to see the fastest growth of all quality segments, expanding at a rate of 3.9% over the next six years and driving annual consumption up to 458m cases a year. The share of the premium-and-above wine and spirits market is projected to increase from 6.8% in 2015 to 8.4% by 2021.